I was put on an elective induction list at 39 weeks, but wasn’t called in until I was 39+2. Hubs and I got the call at 1:00am February 11th, and rushed to shower and eat and got to the hospital by 2:00am. They placed my IV (18 gauge which hurt more than my epidural) and monitored baby and I for about an hour. They checked me and I was 3cm dilated, 50% effaced, -3 station. At 3:00am they started me on Pitocin. They started it at a 2 and by noon it had been gradually increased to 12. The contractions were painful, but not excruciating. I got my epidural and it completely took away all the contraction pains. Unfortunately, the epidural sent my blood pressure down to 90/50 which made me temporarily partially lose my hearing and blur my vision. They decided to bolus my IV fluids to combat this. I received another fluid bolus at some point during my labor, but I do not remember when. Over the next few hours I progressed slowly as they increased the pitocin to 18, and at around 4:00pm my doctor decided to break my waters.

My contractions immediately became more intense and frequent after this, and my nurse eventually had to completely turn off the pitocin because I was having too many contractions. At this point (probably around 6 or 7pm) I was laboring naturally, without the use of pitocin.

By around 9pm I was in transition, and was shaking uncontrollably. I was also feeling intense vaginal pain with every contraction. This worried me because I had an epidural, which should have erased all pain below the waist.

By 10pm I was fully dilated and effaced, and our doctor had come in on her day off to help us. I was still shaking and barely able to speak, and the vaginal pain had become very intense with each contraction.

My doctor advised that I start pushing when I felt the urge. I pushed for 2 hours, feeling all of it. I never had the feeling of my body pushing involuntarily. The last 45 minutes consisted of me pushing until I could see his head poking out, but then he would recede back into the birth canal between contractions. I kept asking the doctors - begging them to tell me why he wasn’t coming out. They would just look at each other with concern but refuse to answer me. I started to feel pretty hopeless. By this time there were probably 10 people in my room including doctors, nurses and med students.

The doctors had me pushing 3 times for 10 second bursts through every contraction. This tactic hadn’t been doing the job, and the doctor told me she might bring in a vacuum to get my baby out. Hubs and I were not comfortable with this at all. He told me to ignore what the doctors said and just push non-stop through every contraction, without taking any breaks. This worked and finally, during back to back contractions, I pushed his head and body out. I was relieved he was out, but it was the most excruciating pain I have ever felt in my life. I ended up with a 3rd degree tear and multiple lateral tears. The baby was wiped off and brought onto my chest. At this point I was crying hysterically - not registering much of what was going on. The doctors predicted he would be 6.5-7lbs - but he was 8lbs 14oz! Everyone was so shocked!

While I held my little son, the doctors administrated a lidocaine local anesthetic to sew up the tear. They started sewing and I freaked out and yelled at them to stop - I could feel all of it. They were surprised but administered a second dose. This second dose didn’t work and I still felt it. At this point, I just sucked it up. Hubs and I got to cuddle and love on our little boy! After they finished closing the tear, my doctor said there was another tear and asked if I wanted her to close it. I said yes, and a nurse offered me fentanyl in my IV. I gladly took it, and it worked pretty well for the stitching. This was the first pain reliever that worked effectively during my birth experience.

After the doctors left and we were left with just one nurse, I was able to calm down a little and bond with baby.

I will never ever get an induction again if I can help it 😭 definitely won’t do an epidural again. I think laboring upright might have helped prevent some tearing.